


the tempest-tossed sea

by pmonkey816



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, beau is beau and swears every other word, just make love you cowards, kinda angsty tbh but y'all know i'm incapable of not writing angst, sort of light bdsm dynamics but kinda not really, they're both pretending to have rough impersonal sex but they're not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 15:09:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18346157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pmonkey816/pseuds/pmonkey816
Summary: Yasha finds herself alone in a bedroom with Beau, who is still wearing that damn harness.Yasha finds this... intriguing.Yasha finds THAT confusing and terrifying.





	the tempest-tossed sea

“Will you get this fucking thing off me?”

 

Beau is wriggling like the leather of the harness strapped around her is burning her where it touches, like the sensation is so unpleasant she’d sooner climb out of her own skin than wear it another second. And it makes sense to Yasha, in a way, that she would. It’s something she has always admired about Beau, her ability to be free from authority. Yasha has certainly never felt comfortable without guidance, without direction, without cause.

 

The moment’s sort of a perfect metaphor for Beau, she thinks, as she watches her turn and scrabble uselessly at buckles designed to only be loosened by someone else. It probably doesn’t help Beau’s itchy sort of restlessness with confinement that they’d almost been imprisoned today, or that their future remains unclear. Yasha is exhausted and set on edge, and she can tell Beau is, too. She can tell a lot about Beau’s moods by the purse of her lips or the tilt of her head or the tension in her fists. She supposes it’s the kind of thing that comes with familiarity, with watching someone long enough.

 

If she’s honest, the thought frightens her a bit. She knows what happens when she becomes too familiar with people. An aching chill pulses through her nerves and she shudders, suppresses the thought of Zuella’s dead eyes staring up at her, at a multicolored coat flapping in the wind, the magician’s judge swinging toward her friends, her own blind rage toward them building to a fever pitch. She’s so tired of thinking about it, of wallowing in her own guilt, so instead she watches Beau’s little dance as she tries to reach the clasp that, for all of her monk training and agility, she’s hopelessly unable to get to, and she smiles. Beau and Jester have been the only two people in the world that can make her smile this side of the Xhorhasian border and she’s grateful for them. She’s especially grateful one of them is here with her. Even outnumbered a thousand to one, she feels somehow safer with Beau by her side.

 

She steps toward her friend’s turned back, placing a calming hand on the harness’ buckles, finding herself pausing to trace along the intricate straps, fingers trailing along the spots where Beau’s skin is exposed on her lower back. She’d meant to just unbuckle the thing and let Beau out of it, but she’s always found Beau’s ropy musculature fascinating, and now that she’s touching it she can’t seem to stop herself. She’s sure Beau would be a rail if it weren’t for her constant training making her compact and strong, leaving her muscles defined and toned. She’s never touched Beau like this before, and as her fingers brush along the smooth, soft skin of her back, she can’t imagine why she resisted it for so long.

 

“I don’t know.” Yasha says softly, now letting her hand slide along Beau’s side to her stomach, feeling it tense and tremble just a bit. “I kind of like you like this.”

 

Beau goes taut, a bow string ready to release (Yasha can’t help but smile, thinking of how annoyed the metaphor would make her—Beau with a bow on a bo….), her hands frozen where they’d been clawing at the straps around her shoulders, trying desperately to shrug out of them. She can’t see Beau’s face so she’s not sure what she’s thinking, but she’s making no attempt to stop her or move away or even to say something rude and insulting, so she thinks Beau probably can’t figure out why it’s taken them so long to get here, either.

 

“Gotta be honest,” Beau starts to drawl in reply, voice her usual low smarm with just the slightest waver underneath the bravado, “out of all the ways I tried to flirt with you, wouldn’t have guessed this would be the thing that did it for you.”

 

“Me, either.” Yasha says, voice still soft and reverent.

 

The way she’s touching Beau, stroking along the top of the sash holding her pants in place, is impulsive in a way she’s not familiar with. Whatever it is, she wants to push forward, wants to keep touching, wants to say ‘I’m sorry’ again and again with her hands and her tongue. She wants to stop seeing the desperate glint in Beau’s eye as she swung at Yasha, not even pulling her punches, trying to knock the fog of the Incubus’ charm from her mind. She can’t take seeing the fallen bodies of her friends burned onto the backs of her eyelids anymore, needs to forget the thoughts the creature had put into her head—that the Mighty Nein are using her, don’t care for her. That she was just a trophy for Beau, an opportunity to jump into bed the way she did the moment Yasha was out of the picture, suffering alone in the den of the Iron Shepherds. None of it was real, she knows this now, and above all she wants to atone.

 

She can’t lose anyone else.

 

Maybe she does know what this feeling is, this feeling is want. She wants Beau, in a desperate way she has only felt before toward Zuella in the months since her death. Wants her in the way someone usually only wants something after it’s no longer attainable. She _longs_ for her like this is the last time they’ll ever see each other, like she’ll wake up tomorrow and Beau will be gone, dead. Is it really so radical a thought? They all took a beating in the last fight they were in, and now they are in the heart of an empire they bear no allegiance to. What if they never have a chance for this, later? Like she never had the chance to show Molly how to fish, or to run away with Zuella to a little shack in the wilderness where they could kiss freely?

 

And it’s oh-so-complicated, their lives, but Beau is here, alone in this room with Yasha, yielding to her touch, and that? That feels simple. Good.

 

Yasha grasps the back of the harness with the hand that’s not currently touching Beau’s stomach, yanking hard on it so that she’s forced backward, tight against Yasha’s body, her other hand coming up diagonally across her chest to hold her in place and stroke purposefully along the exposed skin of her collarbone. And Beau’s still tense, but not in the same way as before. Now she’s arched, pressing into Yasha, no longer fighting against her restraints. It’s interesting, how quickly it turned. Maybe Beau isn’t so against being confined or commanded, after all, as long as the right person is holding her leash.

  
“Do you like it?” Yasha asks, curling down to speak lowly though not menacingly against the shell of Beau’s ear. “Now that it’s just you and me?”

 

Beau wiggles and lets out a whine that’s half stubborn brat and half breathy moan, but nods in spite of her instinct to be contrary for the sake of it.

 

That’s enough for Yasha to know she can keep going, but there’s a voice in the back of her head that makes her pause, makes her push for more confirmation that Beau’s enjoying herself. She slides the hand currently at Beau’s collarbone up to her throat and forces her head up and over, forces her to look up into her eyes. She can’t help it when her gaze drops to Beau’s lips, split from the last fight but healing, full and slightly parted and panting and all but begging to be kissed. She leans down, letting her own ghost over them, barely brushing, eyes still open and locked onto Beau’s.

 

“Tell me you like this, that you want it.” She says, more command than question in her tone now, emboldened by Beau’s new reactions to her, by the intense, penetrating blue of her monk’s gaze, her eyes the way they normally are only in battle, letting Yasha know she is choosing to cede, that she is trusting, that she could slip away at any moment and they both know it.

 

Beau’s hips buck and a burst of shaky breath hits Yasha’s lips. “I like being alone with you.”

 

Yasha’s free hand releases the strap of the harness and moves down to pin Beau’s hips against Yasha’s thighs. “And?”

 

Beau’s eyelids flutter and she tries to buck again, but is held firmly in place. She lets out another low whine. “And I want you.”  
  
Yasha rolls her eyes, an amused but predatory smirk quirking in the corner of her mouth. “And the harness? Do you like it now?”

 

Beau’s jaw clenches and flexes for a couple seconds, her eyes going defiant, and Yasha loosens her grip a bit, in case she wants to break free of her grasp. But after a couple seconds she shuts her eyes and swallows, the muscles in her throat contracting against Yasha’s palm, then opens them again.

 

“I like wearing it for you,” she grits out through her teeth, “I like that you like it.”

 

Yasha’s smile turns benevolent and sweet in a second—Beau willingly wearing a symbol of obedience on her behalf feels oddly meaningful. She shifts her hand to stroke her thumb along Beau’s lips, dipping it in between them. Beau’s tongue rises to meet it, swirl around the tip of it, beckon it in further, and pleasure courses through Yasha and bursts from her lips in a surprised gasp. The feeling pulses through her veins like a poison, radiating from where Beau’s back keeps grinding against her groin. She has the desire to push her thumb in deeper, then her fingers, to let Beau suck on them, taste her skin and lick the salt and sweat from it. She likes the idea of Beau, open and wanting for every touch, every taste. But there’s something she wants far more than that first.

 

“I’m glad.” She says softly, sliding her thumb off of Beau’s lip to paint a stripe of saliva down her chin, a mirror of Yasha’s own war paint.

  
Then, she leans in to press her lips to Beau’s.

 

Yasha feels hungry for Beau, desperate for her, but the kiss is still soft, somehow sweet. And Beau mirrors it perfectly, to Yasha’s surprise. None of the brash impatience she’d always expected from her, no rushing to the finish line. She’s not even really wriggling anymore, not really bucking or fighting Yasha’s grip, instead just grinding slowly back against her body, like a dance, a ritual. Like it’s so entirely instinctual she doesn’t even mean to be doing it at all.

 

It’s the kind of first kiss people share when it’s the first of many, when they want to do it well, to find all the little tricks, to get the muscle memory just right so that they can make each other weak from the simple feel of their lips together.

 

The kiss and Beau moving against her makes Yasha dizzy and breathless and for a minute she forgets that she’s holding Beau still against her, that they’re not embracing like lovers. She pulls back and blinks a couple times, trying to get a handle on her breathing, just taking in the dazed, starry look in Beau’s eyes.

 

“Whoa.” Beau whispers, licking at her lips like she couldn’t stand to lose a drop of Yasha’s taste. “That was, like, super hot.”

 

Yasha nods, eyes flickering across Beau’s trying to discern what she’s feeling, what she’s thinking. All she really succeeds in doing is getting sucked into her gaze, lost in the speckles and swirls of her irises, the veins in the whites, the deep, abyssal black of her blown pupils. They’ve always had this connection, right? This spark? This isn’t what Beau feels for the other girls she flirts with or jokes about wanting to sleep with. Beau didn’t look at that dwarf this way, did she? This is just for her, right?

 

Yasha shuts her eyes against the feeling building in her chest, so reminiscent of the insecurity and jealousy the Incubus had freed in her. She doesn’t want to accept that those feelings were a part of her— _are_ a part of her—or think about what they mean. She can’t, not again. Not now. She releases Beau from her grasp and takes a step back, fingers fumbling with the straps of the harness, suddenly feeling the burning need to get it off of her, to get everything off of both of them, to be close to Beau, to drop this pretense of control and force. She wants to communicate with her hands the kinds of concepts and feelings her words have never been able to. She wants to feel Beau’s skin, see all of the scars and marks, wants to watch her nipples contract and harden under Yasha’s fingers, her tongue. She wants to bite her, to taste her, to be the only thing she can think about, even if it’s only for the next hour.

 

The thing finally comes undone and Beau immediately and gleefully slides out of it. Yasha tosses it to the side, letting it clang against a gilded dresser, one of the metal rings knocking a chip into the oval mirror hung above it. Neither of them has the wherewithal to notice or care, because Yasha is stalking forward, shrugging off her furs and belts and then her shirt, forcing Beau backward towards the plush bed with her presence. Beau, for her part, has ditched her own shirt and forced herself to move back only at Yasha’s relatively slow pace. Yasha can tell it’s killing her, that she wants to be on the bed, with Yasha’s hands on her right now, a minute ago, a _month_ ago. Yasha knows just how fast Beau can be when she wants to, that Beau is going slow to please her. And gods, knowing Beau wants to please her just makes the throbbing between her thighs, her own desire to rush, that much stronger.

 

When she finally gets there, with the back of Beau’s knees pressed into the bed, Yasha gives her a gentle but firm shove backward and Beau sprawls, catching herself on her elbows, one knee flying out to steady her.

 

Yasha yanks on Beau’s sash harshly, forcing Beau’s hips to jerk with it. “These. Off.” She grunts, and drops to her knees to start unlacing the long boots Beau wears and pulling them off, her pants and sash following quickly after. Yasha doesn’t stand, instead taking some time to admire Beau’s legs, running a hand up one of the muscled calves, getting a little twitch when she reaches the back of Beau’s knee.

 

“That tickles.” Beau breathes, and Yasha looks up, sees her propped up on her elbows and craning her neck to watch what Yasha is doing.

 

Yasha raises an eyebrow. “Lay down.”

 

Beau swallows and bites her lip and for a second Yasha thinks she’s going to challenge her, push her buttons a little, fight back, maybe even take control. But instead, she releases her lip from her teeth and flops back on the bed with an exaggerated groan of frustration. Her hands come up to rest over her face, maybe in an attempt to stem her desire to look? Yasha finds her bullheaded impatience—usually so maddening—oddly endearing under these circumstances and she presses a little kiss to Beau’s knee in thanks.

 

And she decides that maybe that’s what she wanted to do anyway, to press her lips to Beau’s thigh, alternating her lips and her teeth and her tongue, moving as slowly as she can stand, rubbing light patterns onto the other. Beau’s thighs are twitching and clenching with the touches, the thick scent of her flooding Yasha’s nose as she inches closer to its source. Finally, she reaches Beau’s cunt and presses her legs wide to splay it for her, keeping them pinned with her forearms. Beau inhales sharply, and the tension in her abdomen lets Yasha know she’s looking again, but Yasha can’t be bothered to care right now because Beau smells so good and is glistening so beautifully she doesn’t want to look away. She inhales deeply, breathing in the intoxicating scent of her, imagining the taste, the slick across her cheeks and chin. She hadn’t intended to do this, but she can’t help herself.

 

She leans forward and presses her tongue against Beau’s opening, pressing into her with it and lapping up.

 

“Oh, fuck!” Beau shouts, her head snapping back to the bed and her hands bunching into the sheets. Her thighs try to shut, to clamp her head in place so she can’t move away, but Yasha holds them still easily.

 

Yasha licks into her again and again, fucking Beau with her tongue, careful to not get caught up and go too fast or move to her clit—she’s not trying to get Beau off just yet. As she does, she can see Beau getting frustrated, her mounting pleasure hitting a plateau, especially since she’s being held firmly in place and can’t position Yasha’s tongue where she wants it.

 

“Yash. I need—” Hearing Beau moan out her name sends another burst of pleasure deep through her, an ache pounding its way into her very soul. She looks up, eyes locking onto Beau’s, tongue still lapping into her. Beau’s plea is cut off by a loud moan as Yasha hits that _spot_ in her again, this time with their gazes locked. “Higher,” she finally manages to pant out, “just a little higher.”

 

Beau is probably close, from what Yasha can tell. Her body is tense, covered in sweat, her cunt dripping with a combination of slick and saliva, Beau’s upper thighs glistening as much as Yasha’s face. Which means it’s as good a time as any to take a break. She tilts her head off to the side as if she’s considering Beau’s request, unable to stop the slow grin from spreading across her face.

 

Then, she rises and stands there at the foot of the bed, towering over Beau’s naked, prone body. She pushes her own pants down over her hips and she’s not sure but she doesn’t think Beau is breathing anymore, eyes moving desperately over Yasha’s body like she’s trying to remember all of it, like she thinks it’s a dream she’s going to wake up from any second.

 

Yasha crawls on top of her, straddling Beau’s hips, just barely not touching her. Beau’s arms come up to grasp at her back, to try in vain to pull her in, closer, to touch as much as she can. Yasha kisses her, without bothering to wipe any of the remains of what she’s done off her mouth. She wants Beau to taste herself, to feel Yasha’s tongue against hers and think of where that tongue had just been, how it had felt, what it could do. She wants Beau to kiss her and think, _yours_.

 

But no, Beau can’t be hers, not even for a moment, not even for pretend. Yasha already belongs to someone else, she’d promised. She would give anything to have her back, she’d thought that a million times. What had she been thinking? A familiar rage begins to bubble in the back of her head, and she reaches up and tugs a fistful of Beau’s hair, releasing her from the kiss when her head arches back and she gasps out in pain and pleasure. Yasha moves down to her neck, biting into the flesh, suddenly harsh when before she’d been gentle, caring. She makes several bites before she notices Beau wincing away from her a little and she stops, panting into Beau’s collarbone, trying to get a handle on her anger, to make it go away. After all, the last thing she wants is to hurt Beau. Not again.

 

Her brain,  being pulled back from the brink of a rage, feels like it’s stuck . On the one hand, her body’s begging her to keep going, to touch Beau, to be touched by her,  to seek comfort and solace in her arms . On the other, her mind is screaming  _betrayal_ , how could she have forgotten Zuella so quickly? For this womanchild who hops from one person’s bed to another, who is afraid of her own feelings? Who will surely leave her the second she feels something related to boredom? She’s a damn fool, is what she is, and it occurs to her that she needs to stop this right now.

 

And then Beau is touching her cheek so gently, as though she can sense the tears Yasha can no longer cry over her lost love and is trying to brush them away. “Yasha, if something’s wrong, we can stop.” Her voice is hoarse but soft as her fingers.

 

She knows she’s harsh on Beau, everyone is. Because she can be abrasive and insensitive and  childish and  entitled and brash, but she can also be kind and caring and  sincere and thoughtful and  cunning, and those are the things that have brought them here, to this bed right now. She looks up to meet Beau’s gaze and she realizes she has no chance in the face of those eyes, the concern written into her face that normally seems so naive but now  just seems open, willing to take the world as it comes and face it .

 

Yasha moves back up to Beau’s face and kisses her again, back to their soft, gentle kisses, doing her best to reassure Beau that she hasn’t done anything wrong, that Yasha’s not upset with her.  There are so many reasons not to do this, but she’s so worn out, and she wants it so much... She takes Beau’s hand and holds it between them, examining the thin fingers and the short nails and the calloused palms. She runs her own fingers over all of it, ending with kisses to each fingertip, to the center of her palm.  Touching Beau calms her, tethers her to herself.

 

“Touch me?” She’s not sure if it’s a request or a question, and Beau doesn’t seem to be either.

 

“We don’t have to.” She states, a little hope at the tinges like she’s holding back from doing exactly that until she knows for sure it’s what Yasha wants.

 

“Touch me.” Yasha says again, softer, bringing Beau’s hand to her neck, dragging it down past her collarbone, over her heart, to her breast. She cries out when Beau’s fingers slip over her nipple for the first time—honestly, it’s been nine months at least since anyone’s touched her and it feels like magic, like Caleb’s haste spell has been cast on her, everything sharpening to a point in her consciousness, until there is only one thing. Just Beau’s fingers, only Beau’s fingers.

 

She exhales shakily and drops her head, letting her long hair form a barricade between her and Beau. Maybe if she doesn’t look at her, doesn’t kiss her, just rides out the pleasure it won’t be like having sex with someone else. Maybe this can just be utilitarian, just two people in proximity to one another getting their needs met. Surely, Zuella wouldn’t begrudge her that? Wouldn’t be upset that Yasha felt good like  _this_ ?  That if Yasha had to live another year, ten years, twenty years, she’d be allowed just a few dalliances? Yasha would certainly want Zuella to have that comfort,  were the tables turned .

 

But Beau has other ideas, because she pushes Yasha’s hair out of the way, back over her head so she can look at her. “Do you want this?” She asks, not stopping her gentle teasing of Yasha’s nipple but not doing anything else, either.

  
Yasha nods. Because that’s honest, at least. She’s not sure she should want it, but she knows for sure that she does.

 

“Okay. Let me know if you want me to stop.” And Beau scoots down under Yasha so that she can take a nipple into her mouth, suck on it gently, toy with the other with a hand.

 

Yasha lets herself sink into the feeling, lets the gears of her mind clatter to a stop. Her eyes shut and she starts to rut against Beau’s hips, groaning, digging strong fingers into Beau’s arm and the bedding.  Eventually, Beau’s  unoccupied  hand slips down over Yasha’s hips, into the crease between her thighs, finding the soft, wet warmth there and sinking into it and Yasha cries out softly as she starts stroking. It feels  both entirely like sex with Zuella but also entirely different, Beau’s fingers hitting her in a different way, at a different angle, with a different pressure. It’s not bad, though. In fact, it feels fucking incredible, and Yasha finds herself lost in the sensation fairly quickly. As she nears climax, she even lets herself think about the fact that it’s Beau’ s fingers slipping over her, bringing her pleasure. She even opens her eyes and looks at her, meets that blue, and her body jolts with a sudden shock of intense pleasure.

 

But try as she might, it doesn’t happen. As often as she comes near to the crest of orgasm, something swats her back down from the precipice, and eventually she grabs Beau’s wrist. Perhaps this is a punishment, then. A wanting that can’t be sated. A fruit she can look at and touch and bite into but not taste.

 

Beau’s eyes go wide. “Is everything okay? It seemed—it looked like—” she’s stammering, pulling her hands away and pulling back, trying to not touch despite being beneath Yasha, “like you were enjoying yourself.”

 

Yasha smiles stiffly, the warmth of Beau’s caring clashing hard against the cold grief of Zuella’s passing and winning out just a little. She brushes her hand through short, sweaty hair until Beau’s body begins to relax. “I was. Very much.” She leans down and kisses Beau again, without tongue or passion, just a reassuring peck. “I just don’t think it’s going to happen tonight.”

 

“Oh.” Beau licks her lips, the starry look back in her eyes, shoulders again slumped into the bed with relief. “Okay, that’s fine. Yeah, that happens.”

 

Yasha chuckles, “it does.” Then brings her hand to Beau’s thigh. “Can I?” she asks. Her fingers start running up the top of it, telegraphing her intentions.

 

Beau nods vigorously. “Fuck yes.”

 

Yasha laughs again, bringing her hand to its target. She’s teased Beau far more than she needed to tonight, and her lover has definitely earned her reward. Yasha thinks maybe she’s earned some reward, too. Maybe she’s earned the pleasure of watching at least, feeling Beau come at her behest. Beau is so wet. So, so wet. For Yasha. Because of her. Yasha lets out a groan and Beau a strangled cry as two of her fingers slide easily into her warmth.

 

“Fuck, your fingers are so _long._ ” Beau groans, hips bucking, already riding them like she doesn’t trust Yasha to actually follow through on letting her reach her orgasm this time.

 

Yasha leans down to place gentle kisses to Beau’s neck, wordless apologies for the blooming bruises her teeth had made earlier.  She swallows back the desire to say it out loud, to beg Beau’s forgiveness for what she’d done. As if understanding,  Beau stretches her neck to the side to give her more space— maybe to forgive her, to trust her— and Yasha takes the opportunity to suck softly on the newly exposed skin,  treating it with a gentle care. “I’ll do better next time.” She whispers against Beau’s skin at the same time she uses her thumb to start rubbing gentle circles on her clit. Beau stiffens and arches into her, and Yasha shifts the position of her hand so that she’s hitting Beau at just the right angle with every thrust, getting faster and shallower along with Beau’s breathing. “I’ll protect you next time, I promise.”

 

She pulls back to watch Beau’s face, the trembling of her jaw, the desperate, almost frightened look in her eyes as she gets closer, like she’s falling and is afraid Yasha won’t catch her. Yasha shifts to the side a little to free up the arm currently holding her full weight off of Beau’s smaller body and uses it to pull Beau in close to her. In response, Beau wraps around her, fully into the embrace,  forehead-to-forehead, one hand in Yasha’s hair and the other gripped tightly to her shoulder. Her breaths only come in little gasps now, like she doesn’t have enough control over her body to breathe in deeply, little moans breaking from her throat with every thrust.

 

“Fuck, Yasha!” At the last second, Beau buries her face in Yasha’s neck, shouting her name into the darkness, the safety of her sweat and hair and skin.

 

All Yasha can feel is the shuddering around her fingers, the jerky motion of Beau’s hips, fingers digging deeply into her skin, lips moving wordlessly against her neck. It’s beautiful, Beau is beautiful. Strong and open and alive.

 

And then she’s collapsed onto the bed, panting, laughing, running hands through hair that is now entirely loose of its ties. “Holy shit.” She looks over at Yasha, grinning. “That was awesome.”

 

Yasha slides her fingers slowly and carefully from her lover, knowing how sensitive she most likely is, and Beau shudders again at the feeling. She brings her hand to her own lips and Beau watches, rapt, as she licks her fingers clean of Beau’s slick.

 

“Fuck.” Beau says again, and it makes Yasha a little proud, honestly, that she’s brought her vocabulary down to just curses and her name. Normally, getting Beau to shut up is a feat.

 

She leans down and kisses her again. “Thank you. I… needed that.”

 

Beau strokes fingers along her cheek, eyes flickering across her face. She wonders briefly if Beau finds her as cryptic and strange as she finds Beau. “No, thank you. Seriously, that was...” She trails off, then looks down for a second, as if she can’t decide whether or not she wants to say any more. Then, “it wasn’t your fault, what happened. No one’s mad at you, you know that, right?”

 

Yasha smiles sadly. “I’m mad at myself. For many reasons.”

 

The corners of Beau’s lips tug down a little, but she nods. “Yeah, I get that.” She strokes a hand over the loosening braids on Yasha’s head. “I think you’re amazing, if that makes any difference to you. And I—I’d like to do this again sometime, if—if you ever feel like—like you want to.” She stammers over her words in a way that surprises Yasha. Beau—cool, suave Beau who has propositioned her more times than she can count—stumbling now?

 

She kisses Beau again, letting it get deeper for a minute, though not heated. Just thorough and careful. She can’t make any promises. Tomorrow might not come, she might feel overwhelming guilt, the Stormlord might strike her down where she stands for this, Zuella’s ghost may start haunting her even more than it already does, so that she never feels goodness again. But right now, she can’t imagine being apart from Beau, can’t imagine the world outside this hazy afterglow.

 

“Maybe.” she says.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm back on my fandom shit again because of a stupid awkward monk and a traumatized warrior lady. no one is surprised. hopefully you are all delighted.
> 
> *insert person shrugging emoji here*


End file.
